“I do not seek death,” said Master Richard.

The clerk leaned over him a little, and Master Richard saw his eyes bent upon him with great tenderness.

“Master Hermit,” he said, “I entreat you not to be your own enemy.  You see that those that know you best love you, but they do not think you to be what you think you are—–­”

“I am nothing but God’s man, and a sinner,” said the lad.

“Well, they think your visions and the rest to be but delusions.  And if they be delusions, why should not other matters be delusions too?”

“What matters?” asked Master Richard.

“Such matters as the tidings that you brought to the King.”

“And what is it you would have me to do?” asked Master Richard again after a silence.

“It is only a little thing, poor lad—­such a little thing! and then you will be able to go whither you will.”

“And what is that little thing?”

“It is to tell me that you think them delusions too.”

“But I do not think them so,” said Master Richard.

“Think as you will then, Master Hermit; but, you know, when folks are sick we may tell them anything without sin.  And the King is sick to death.  I do not believe that you have bewitched him:  you have too good a face and air for that—­and for the matter of the paternoster I do not value it at a straw.  The King is sick with agony at what he thinks will come upon him after your words.  He will not listen to my lord cardinal:  he sits silent and terrified, and has taken no food to-day.  But if you will but tell him, Master Hermit, that you were mistaken in your tidings—­that it was but a fancy, and that you know better now—­all will be well with him and with you, and with us all who love you both.”

So the clerk spoke, tempting him, and leaned back again on his heels; and Master Richard lay a great while silent.

* * * * *

Now, I do not know who was this young man, whether he were a clerk or whether he were not a devil in form of a man.  I could hear nothing of him at Court when I went there.  It may be that he was one of those idle fellows that had come to Master Richard from time to time to ask him to make them hermits with him, else how did he know the matters of the stag and the pig and the stream and the rest?  But it does not greatly matter whether his soul were a devil’s or a man’s, for in any case his words were Satan’s.  If I had not heard what came after I should have believed this temptation to be the most subtle ever devised in hell and permitted from heaven.  He spoke so tenderly and so sweetly; he commanded his features so perfectly; he seemed to speak with such love and reasonableness.

Yet I would have you know that Master Richard did not yield by a hair’s breadth in thought.  He examined the temptation carefully, setting aside altogether the question as to whether I had spoken as this young man had said that I had.  Whether I had spoken so or not made no difference.  It was this that he was bidden to do, to say that he had erred in his tidings, to confess that they were not from God; to be a faithless messenger to our Lord.